Our Leadership

Staff

The Right Question Institute is led by Co-Directors Luz Santana and Dan Rothstein, who are part of the founding core of the organization. Additional senior staff: Kate Hornstein, Director of Development.

Luz Santana, M.A., has modeled in her own life–raising her family on welfare, working on the factory floor, going back to school and then sharing her new skills with others–much of what we aim to accomplish through the work of the organization. She has extensive experience designing and implementing applications of the educational strategy in work in low-income communities, and she is recognized nationally for the participatory trainings and workshops she has designed and facilitated. Luz was chosen as a Community Fellow at M.I.T, and the Merrimack Valley Woman of the Year. She has served as a parent advocate in Lawrence, MA, and as an adjunct faculty member at the Springfield College – Boston Campus. In 1996, she received a Master’s Degree from the Springfield College School of Human Services. (email: luz at rightquestion dot org)

Dan Rothstein, Ed.D., has spent many years learning from the people with whom he has worked and has applied those lessons to designing strategies to promote more effective advocacy and citizen participation efforts. Prior to his work with RQI, he developed and implemented programs in Kentucky, Massachusetts, and Israel as a community educator, organizer and urban planner. He served as Director of Neighborhood Planning for the City of Lawrence, MA and was a Fulbright Scholar and one of the very few non-academics to be chosen as a National Academy of Education Spencer Fellow. He graduated from Harvard College and earned a doctorate in Education and Social Policy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education where he served as an editor of The Harvard Educational Review. (email: dan at rightquestion dot org)

Kate Hornstein, M.A., recently joined the staff of the Right Question Institute as Director of Development. Kate has over 20 years of fundraising experience as both a staff member and consultant with organizations ranging from the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, to the Caring for Carcinoid Foundation. Much of her work has focused on human services, children’s causes, and education. Kate holds a B.A. in English from Oberlin College and an M.A. in English from Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. (email: kate at rightquestion dot org)

Fellows

Naomi Campbell has recently joined the Right Question Institute as the inaugural Microdemocracy Fellow. She earned a B.A. in history and political science from Washington University in St. Louis in the spring of 2012, after completing a senior thesis in history on Mapuche identity struggles under democratic and military rule in Chile. Naomi worked with RQI in the summer of 2011 on a variety projects, returning in the summer of 2012 as the Coordinator of Summer Interns and as a research associate. During her year as a Microdemocracy Fellow she will provide support in all programmatic areas and will work in collaboration with Dan Rothstein and Luz Santana on the presentation of RQI’s theory of Microdemocracy. (email: naomi.campbell at rightquestion dot org)

Rebecca Howe, a Patient Activation Fellow with the Right Question Institute, first connected with RQI two years ago while beginning research for her senior thesis at Harvard. For her thesis in Social Studies, she designed and conducted a study at a local community health center to understand the impact of the RQI strategy on patient engagement. After graduating in 2011, she worked with Dan and Luz to clarify the impact and message of the Right Question Effective Patient Strategy (RQ-EPS). Rebecca hopped coasts but has followed her passion for patient-centered research and now serves as a research assistant at the University of California San Francisco Breast Care Center. She continues to support RQI’s work in health care and enjoys staying up to date with medical literature on patient activation and shared decision-making.

Board

The Right Question Institute Board provides strong support for the work of RQI staff to develop a new model for building capacity in low-income communities, for identifying ways for systemic integration of RQI methods and for the development of the concept of Microdemocracy. The Board includes a former Head Start parent, frontline staff in different fields and professions, university scholars and a wide range of extensive civic expertise in various fields.

Agnes S. Bain, Treasurer: Professor of Government, Suffolk University

Lavada Berger: Third Grade Teacher, North Star Academy, Newark, NJ

Macky Buck, Clerk: Family day care provider and early childhood educator

National Advisory Board

Archon Fung: Ford Foundation Professor of Democracy and Citizenship, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University

Craig Kennedy: President, The German Marshall Fund

Bill Kovach: Chair, Committee of Concerned Journalists

Martha Minow: Dean, Harvard Law School

Wendy Puriefoy: President, The Public Education Network

Funding

Financial support for RQI comes from three sources: Individual donors, Service-related revenue and Foundation grants.

Individual Donors

We are deeply grateful to the many individual donors who provide essential support for the work of The Right Question Institute (RQI). Donors support the:

development of RQI’s innovative educational strategy that helps people learn to become more self-sufficient

dissemination of the strategy to organizations and programs all around the country

development of new methods and new ideas for building the capacity of all people, no matter their educational or literacy level, to participate in democracy on all levels and to make democracy work better.

Service-related revenue

We also support our work with income from providing consulting and training services as well as through sales of materials and curricula.

Foundation Grants

RQI’s innovative work also receives strong support from private foundations. The following are some of the funders who have supported our work in various fields:

The Boston Foundation

The Cabot Family Charitable Trust

Carnegie Corporation

The Germanacos Foundation

Herman and Frieda L. Miller Foundation

Jane’s Trust

The Jane B. Cook 1992 Charitable Trust

The Joyce Foundation

The David and Lucile Packard Foundation

Partners HealthCare Community Benefits

The Proteus Fund

The Rhode Island Foundation

Rita Allen Foundation

Rockefeller Brothers Fund

The Wallace Foundation

The Whitman Institute

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